How Venezuela’s authoritarian regime clings to power

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Nearly a month after the Venezuelan elections took place on 28 July, the world still waits to see if the country’s autocratic leader Nicolas Maduro will succeed in his bid to cling to power. Maduro’s government claims they won 51 percent of the vote, with 43 percent going to the Opposition. The opposition coalition claims that they won 67 percent of the vote, with Maduro obtaining only 30 percent. Most international observers, including the few electoral observers sent by the United Nations (UN) and the US-based Carter Center, have decried the election as fraudulent. Political scientist and author Steven Levitsky, the author of ‘How Democracies Die,’ has called these elections “one of the most egregious electoral frauds in modern Latin American history.” Yet, we would be remiss to view this situation solely from the lens of democracy and the exercise of elections. Instead, we must look at it from the purview of how autocracies end.

Political scientist and author Steven Levitsky, the author of ‘How Democracies Die,’ has called these elections “one of the most egregious electoral frauds in modern Latin American history.”

History has taught us that autocrats leave power due to a combination of factors. According to Erica Frantz, an academic who mapped authoritarian regimes from 1946 to 2014, autocrats are generally ousted in seven different ways, “a coup, an election, a popular uprising, an insurgency, a rule change that alters the composition of the ruling group, a foreign power’s imposition, and state dissolution.” Nearly 80 percent of the 239 authoritarian regimes left power between 1946 to 2014 due to a coup, an election, or a popular uprising. It would be worthwhile to examine whether any of these modes of exit could apply to today’s Venezuela.

First is a military coup. At present, this remains highly unlikely in Venezuela. The Venezuelan armed forces have been unequivocal in their support of Maduro. Since the elections on 28 July, Venezuela’s defence minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez, a serving four-star general, has been steadfast in defending Maduro. He has even gone to the extent of calling the Opposition ‘fascists’ and claiming that they are attempting to oust Maduro through a coup d'état. The reason for the military’s support is simple: Maduro has handed over control of the country’s most important natural resources and several of its ministries to the military. Nearly one-third of government ministries in Venezuela have been run by serving military officials over the past decade, including areas like energy and agriculture. Maduro also has at his disposal a vast amount of finances through the National Development Fund (Fondo de Desarrollo Nacional in Spanish, or simply FONDEN), which he can funnel to the military without any oversight from other agencies.

The second most common mode of exit for authoritarians is through elections. If the July elections are anything to go by, Maduro is unlikely to concede power through this route. He has gone to great lengths to justify his electoral victory, including some audacious claims such as Elon Musk masterminding a computer ‘hack’ that targeted the National Electoral Council’s website and data. His response to the Opposition’s claims of winning the elections has been to publicly denounce them as fascists and re-activate a brutal crackdown on protesters and all forms of dissent that he aptly terms Operation ‘Tun Tun’—denoting the sound made to knock on doors as security forces detain anyone who opposes the regime.

Venezuela’s opposition is made up of aspiring politicians who yearn to compete in elections and govern; they are not renegade leaders who would attempt to topple Maduro, and even if some are, they are promptly jailed by the regime.

The third mode of exit, through a popular uprising, also seems unlikely in Venezuela due to Maduro’s strong ties to the armed forces, and the military’s subsequent repression of protesters in the country. Additionally, Venezuela’s opposition is made up of aspiring politicians who yearn to compete in elections and govern; they are not renegade leaders who would attempt to topple Maduro, and even if some are, they are promptly jailed by the regime.

Perhaps the only other parameter that could be relevant to Venezuela’s current situation is the regime’s interoperability with foreign powers. The United States (US) has been candid about its dislike for the Venezuelan regime, offering a reward of US$15 million for information leading to Maduro’s arrest. Yet, the US pressure is balanced by China’s and Russia’s support for Maduro. China has loaned Venezuela over US$50 billion, a majority of which is being paid back in the form of oil-for-loan arrangements. Russia today supplies copious amounts of military hardware and arms to Venezuela. Unsurprisingly, China and Russia were both eager to congratulate Maduro on his ‘re-election’ shortly after the July elections.

Another critical element would be the consequences that Maduro and his inner circle would face in the event of a regime change—would Maduro and his coterie receive asylum in another country and get amnesty from prosecution, or would they be arrested and possibly extradited to the US to face criminal charges? If it is the latter, it would be hard to imagine them willingly giving up power just to end up in jail for the rest of their lives.

For the time being, it seems unlikely that any of these factors would change significantly enough to change the status quo in the short to medium term. In power since 2013, Maduro seems to have learnt the lessons from other failed autocrats, engaging in what Frantz terms as ‘coup-proofing.’

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Hari Seshasayee is a co-founder of Consilium Group and a Visiting Fellow at Observer Research Foundation.

• International Affairs
• America
• electoral fraud
• foreign support
• military coup
• Nicolas Maduro
• political repression
• regime change
• Venezuelan elections

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